Abreena Tompkins, instruction specialist at Surry Community College, has developed a brain-based online course design model based on a meta-analysis of more than 300 articles. In this study, she distilled the following elements of brain-based course design:

y classroom is the one with lots of noise and activity from students. We like to get out from behind our desks, move around and have some fun — while learning. Moving and having fun helps to create a positive classroom culture. And I feel that a positive classroom culture is fundamental to learning. I’m not alone. Researchers from the Institute of Medicine found “children who are more active show greater attention, have faster cognitive processing speed, and perform better on standardized academic tests than children who are less active.”

Medical students at the University of Vermont’s Lerner College of Medicine will no longer be taught in a lecture setting, according to William Jeffries, a dean at the school, who says evidence indicates students retain and understand information offered during instruction better in an “active learning” setting.

Jeffries told NPR neuroscience research indicates that students must not only take in information, but also make sense of it in a way that is easily retained if needed in the future. Chances of students remembering increases if students are required to apply that information to a task, as students in the school will have to do.

Jeffries said there was initially some pushback from professors who were fond of the lecture approach, but he said they were receptive to change once informed that active learning procedures actually are more beneficial to fledging students.

I work part-time with elementary learners - with gifted learners during the school year and teaching maker education camps during the summer. The one thing almost all of them have in common is yelling out, "I can't do this" when the tasks aren't completed upon first attempts or get a little too difficult for them.…

The next generation learning experience should lean heavily on collaboration. I see a trend, especially in the sciences, that worries me. Many instructors discourage or even forbid students from collaborating with their classmates, considering it to be cheating. This puts enormous pressure on students. More importantly, this type of learning does not model what they will encounter in the work world, where they will be not discouraged but, rather, expected to collaborate. While I understand the necessity for independent work, there are other ways to achieve the goal of mastery while encouraging collaboration. Some instructors simply alternate assignments, requiring independent work with collaborative projects. Collaborative work can also be paired with lessons about ethics and plagiarism to help shape our students into responsible, ethical adults.

Some of my contemporaries seem pessimistic about today's students, noticing, for example, that students prefer smartphones to books. I don't subscribe to this pessimistic view. The same tension occurs with every generation: I remember this skepticism from older generations when I was young. Today's students grew up with information at their fingertips, so they think differently and learn differently. We should recognize that what they need from a next generation classroom is different too.

If you put 20 hours of focused deliberate practice into that thing, you will be astounded. Astounded at how good you are.

In this TedX Talk, Josh Kaufman asks his audience, “How long does it take from starting something and being grossly incompetent and knowing it to being reasonably good?”

“In hopefully, as short a period of time as possible. So, how long does that take? Here's what my research says: 20 hours. That's it. You can go from knowing nothing about any skill that you can think of. Want to learn a language? Want to learn how to draw? Want to learn how to juggle flaming chainsaws?”

Kim Flintoff's insight:

If you put 20 hours of focused deliberate practice into that thing, you will be astounded. Astounded at how good you are.

Schools are designed to be practical but this has a hidden drawback. Innovation is often impractical because it’s unpredictable. So, what if the push toward “practical skills” in school is actually making learning impractical? And what if impractical ideas and skills we ignore are actually what students will use later in life?

Kim Flintoff's insight:

Part of the reason I switched from offering "workshops" to PLAYSHOPS about 20 years ago...

One of the most challenging aspects of this school year has been using project-based learning to integrate curriculum. Projects are a beast! It feels like I am boarding a roller coaster each time we begin a new project. In fact, it feels like every project follows the same emotionally turbulent trajectory as pictured below.

“Self-directed learning” is a major catch-phrase of 21st Century educationalists, and undeniably a critical skill in the labor markets of the future. The modern world of work demands that people have demonstrable abilities to self-manage: their time and their inputs. Employees that can be tasked to solve a problem without micro-management, and can be relied upon to use their resources responsibly and sparingly, are highly prized.

On the flip-side, the freedom to meet targets and objectives in “your own way” is also much appreciated by employees. When organisations set objectives, rather than tasks, employees feel a sense of ownership and freedom that contrasts with the rote task completion of employment in by-gone days. By dictating the end-goal, rather than the process, organisations empower teams to deliver projects in more creative and effective ways.

Then there’s the “gig economy” – 34% of America’s workforce already self-identify as freelancers. Vast trenches of educated professionals are pursuing bona fide, and profitable careers shopping their specialist skills on the global, highly competitive freelance market. Whether they learned it at school or not – these individuals are required to have massive amounts of daily drive, discipline and time management. In short: their entire work-life is self-directed.

“When you’re just pretending and reading Madame Bovary because everyone else reads it . . . Who cares! That’s SO boring. Ooh, and now we’re reading Hamlet. And this is the place where we get to talk about Polonius. Stale. It’s absolutely stale. And no real learning will take place in an environment like that.”

These are just a few of the thoughts Matthew Patterson, winner of last year’s TNTP Fishman Prize for Superlative Classroom Practice, offered to us on how he selects literature in his classroom. We recently had a chance to chat with Mr. Patterson, and in the process, ended up having an unbelievably fascinating (and hilarious) conversation on how to design curriculum. Enjoy!

Translating scientific results, conclusions, and recommendations into language easily understood by non-experts is a critical skill for scientists and science learners.

In short, science communication is a critical area of development for science education.

This project developed and evaluated a suite of scenarios that can be used as real-time role-plays that enhance communication skills.

Through these role-plays, learners can gain experience in realistic and challenging situations where they need to rapidly respond in an uncertain environment, and effectively communicate with a range of stakeholders.

Indiana University's Mosaic Active Learning Initiative, a program launched in fall 2015 that supports faculty teaching, research and classroom design for active learning environments, has expanded to five of the institution's regional campus: IU East, IU Kokomo, IU Northwest, IU South Bend and IU Southeast.

The move brings 14 new Mosaic Faculty Fellows into the program. Fellows are "faculty who, over the course of an academic year, teach in Mosaic classrooms, share approaches to active and collaborative learning, engage in research related to active learning classrooms, and contribute to the development of learning spaces across IU," according to a university announcement

The second move for creating a dynamic classroom is to release control to students so that they can make progress without waiting for the class or teacher and practice the mindset of agency. To do this, a teacher must free students from teacher-delivered instruction and give them content and lessons that they can learn independently.

The traditional classroom model does not lend itself well to students learning independently. Its instructional format is predominantly face-to-face, teacher-delivered lectures or demonstrations of the material, and each cohort of students works through a single, unified curriculum at the pace of the whole group. Other learning models are arising, however, that open broad possibilities for teachers to empower students to drive their own learning while teachers shift to helping students in other ways. The main technical innovation behind these new models is online learning, which simplifies the task of putting content and lessons directly in the hands of students for them to control themselves.

Kim Flintoff's insight:

The second move for creating a dynamic classroom is to release control to students so that they can make progress without waiting for the class or teacher and practice the mindset of agency. To do this, a teacher must free students from teacher-delivered instruction and give them content and lessons that they can learn independently.

The traditional classroom model does not lend itself well to students learning independently. Its instructional format is predominantly face-to-face, teacher-delivered lectures or demonstrations of the material, and each cohort of students works through a single, unified curriculum at the pace of the whole group. Other learning models are arising, however, that open broad possibilities for teachers to empower students to drive their own learning while teachers shift to helping students in other ways. The main technical innovation behind these new models is online learning, which simplifies the task of putting content and lessons directly in the hands of students for them to control themselves.

Authentic learning is a useful approach for encouraging our learners to develop the critical thinking skills and confidence needed to tackle real-life situations. However, it can be hard to get out of the more traditional mindset where the teacher is the source of knowledge and assessment of information learned is done through the use of clear right or wrong answers to standard questions.

The definition for authentic learning is rather encompassing and may make it difficult for a teacher to get a handle on how to approach its implementation and direct learners in questioning. However, if you have seen kids in an engaged classroom, you may have stumbled upon one of the pillars that are fundamental in an authentic learning experience.

The roots of student interest are described in the KQED web site article, “How the Power of Interest Drives Learning”:

1 A seven-year-long study by Judith Harackiewicz showed that interest predicted long term learning outcomes more accurately than students’ initial grades in a course. In general, writes Harackiewicz, “research has found that interest is a more powerful predictor of future choices than prior achievement or demographic variables.”

2 The research of Paul Silvia suggests that to be interesting, material must be novel, complex, and comprehensible.

The first point implies that capturing and maintaining interest are vital to success, and that interest is perhaps the great leveler, as opposed to students’ existing assets. Educators need to get this right.

The second point provides plausible explanations for why we’re still challenged on the engagement front these days, in spite of the new tools.

Kim Flintoff's insight:

The first point implies that capturing and maintaining interest are vital to success, and that interest is perhaps the great leveler, as opposed to students’ existing assets. Educators need to get this right.

The second point provides plausible explanations for why we’re still challenged on the engagement front these days, in spite of the new tools.

Project-based learning (PBL) is a trend that’s spreading faster than a wildfire during a drought. Why? Because research on PBL proves that it increases student engagement and achievement, and helps students develop the 21st-century skills they need to succeed in their future careers.

For PBL to reach its full potential, though, educators must learn to step back and be facilitators in the classroom, a change that requires thoughtful and ongoing professional development. Here, three educators offer their insights on what it takes to roll out and support a successful PBL implementation.

In contrast with most classroom learning activities that involve abstract knowledge which is and out of context, Lave argues that learning is situated; that is, as it normally occurs, learning is embedded within activity, context and culture. It is also usually unintentional rather than deliberate. Lave and Wenger call this a process of “legitimate peripheral participation”[2].

Knowledge needs to be presented in authentic contexts — settings and situations that would normally involve that knowledge. Social interaction and collaboration are essential components of situated learning — learners become involved in a “community of practice” which embodies certain beliefs and behaviors to be acquired. As the beginner or novice moves from the periphery of a community to its center, he or she becomes more active and engaged within the culture and eventually assumes the role of an expert.

The really big issues facing us as a society have proved to be somehow marginal to our key concerns with university curriculums. The big challenges of our times are not central to our learning. Peter Hymen in his recent report Engaging with Others has observed that we have a one dimensional higher education system in a multidimensional world; that we are living in an age of big challenges, big data, big dilemmas, big crises and big opportunities; yet universities too often are small in ambition, small in their values proposition, and small in their scope.

Hymen argues that we need something different that can meet the challenges of our times and where we can properly engage with learning. His suggestion is that we need an engaged higher education that is academic (based deeply in literacy and numeracy and which is empowering); is about character building (involving independence and autonomy, resilience and open-mindedness for the individual); and is concerned with creativity, craftsmanship and a can-do approach to innovation (which is about problem solving).

Kim Flintoff's insight:

"If we can offer our students an engaged curriculum that will equip them with the knowledge, passion and skills for an improved social result then we will see the signs of a new culture beginning to emerge, one that has real impact on the big issues facing engaged universities, such as action on poverty, the marginalisation of young people, the need for democratic engagement and the impact of new technologies"

At a recent academic conference, I attended a plenary session on active learning. While spouting the virtues of student engagement, the presenter seemed to be admonishing cellphone use in class, labeling it as a sign of distracted and bored learners.

I was feeling uncomfortable in the second row from the front because I was using my phone to take pictures, live-tweet the lecture and engage with other conference attendees on social media. I wondered, “Is he talking about me?” However, not only was I paying attention, but I was also completely engaged in and interacting with his content in a self-directed way. If that’s not active learning, I don’t know what is.

Researchers in Michigan show that project-based learning in high-poverty communities can produce statistically significant gains in social studies and informational reading.

Does project-based learning (PBL) raise student achievement? If you’ve been involved in PBL for long, you’ve undoubtedly encountered this question. Over the last few years as education researchers at University of Michigan and Michigan State University, we have worked to address this question through a large study of the effects of PBL on social studies and some aspects of literacy achievement in second-grade classrooms. We call this initiative Project PLACE: A Project Approach to Literacy and Civic Engagement.

Kim Flintoff's insight:

Researchers in Michigan show that project-based learning in high-poverty communities can produce statistically significant gains in social studies and informational reading.

Michael Wesch’s YouTube videos gave me the courage — and the ideas — to turn more and more of the responsibility for not just learning, but teaching, over to my students. Like most great educators, Wesch, associate professor of cultural anthropology at Kansas State University, is a great communicator. Fortunately for us, he is also a YouTube genius, so you don’t have to take my word for it — watch and hear him directly. Most of us first learned of him when his “The Machine is Us/ing Us” went viral 10 years ago, with more than 11 million views — a look at how the Web and hypertext were changing not just our ways of communicating, but our ways of thinking, as well. He also raised an issue that has come to the forefront most recently — as we use the Web, we are teaching it how to change us more effectively. He says he never intended to make a viral video, it was originally meant for his digital ethnography class.

When I heard a teacher tell me that they were creating recorded lectures for courses as homework assignments and spending classroom time on discussions and more active learning, I knew right then the value of the lecture capture tools.

Lecture capture technologies are not new to education. The enterprise solutions that exist are amazing and powerful. Tegrity, Echo 360, Sonic Foundry, Camtasia Relay, Wimba, and Elluminate have all had a hand in the market for some time and they all provide an opportunity for teachers to record content that students can access in a variety of formats and locations. Additionally, there are a number of free tools on the market that allow instructors to narrate anything on their computer screen are valuable tools in any classroom environment.

“Everything is easier than you think. If you believe otherwise, you are setting yourself up for a hard life.” Learning should not be as hard as you think. There is a method to the art and just like any skill, learning to learn needs practice and mastery. It is much like speed reading. If you know how to read faster, you can end up reading more books in a given time. Similarly, if you learn how to learn efficiently you can spend less time doing the learning and more time enjoying what you have learned.

As a trainer, the topic of learning to learn is even more important since it is not only beneficial to you, but it also helps you to improve your training. As such, it is worth investing time in.

In this article, you will be introduced to seven highly effective techniques that help you maximise learning in a given time. The following methods are presented as if you are applying them to yourself, but you should consider how you can take advantage of them for your learners in a training environment.

Critical instructional design moves toward realizing the possibility for learning that blends a new form of rigor with agency through a practice of inquiry, empathy, and emergence.

The invention of the learning management system was a mistake. And here I’m not going to make the same frustrated argument made numerous times before now that LMSs are limiting structures, that their interface and functionalities control how teachers teach online (although those things are true). The LMS was a mistake because it was premature. In a world that was just waking up to the Internet and the possibility of widely-networked culture, the LMS played to the lowest common denominator, creating a “classroom” that allowed learning—or something like learning—to happen behind tabs, in threaded discussions, and through automated quizzes.

And worse, the LMS convinced us that teaching online was not only possible, it was easy—that digital pedagogy was a mere work of relocation. Take your lectures and your assignments, create a slideshow or a video or a piece of audio, load it all up, and there you have it: online learning.

Kim Flintoff's insight:

Critical instructional design moves toward realizing the possibility for learning that blends a new form of rigor with agency through a practice of inquiry, empathy, and emergence.

The invention of the learning management system was a mistake. And here I’m not going to make the same frustrated argument made numerous times before now that LMSs are limiting structures, that their interface and functionalities control how teachers teach online (although those things are true). The LMS was a mistake because it was premature. In a world that was just waking up to the Internet and the possibility of widely-networked culture, the LMS played to the lowest common denominator, creating a “classroom” that allowed learning—or something like learning—to happen behind tabs, in threaded discussions, and through automated quizzes.

And worse, the LMS convinced us that teaching online was not only possible, it was easy—that digital pedagogy was a mere work of relocation. Take your lectures and your assignments, create a slideshow or a video or a piece of audio, load it all up, and there you have it: online learning.Share your insight

Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson is known for her research on teaming, the idea that in today’s fast-paced world, organizations cannot rely on stable teams; instead, they must embrace a culture of teaming—people coming together impromptu to work on a shifting mix of projects with a shifting mix of partners. She wrote:

Teaming is about identifying essential collaborators and quickly getting up to speed on what they know so you can work together to get things done. This more flexible teamwork (in contrast to stable teams) is on the rise in many industries because the work—be it patient care, product development, customized software, or strategic decision-making—increasingly presents complicated interdependencies that have to be managed on the fly. The time between an issue arising and when it must be resolved is shrinking fast. Stepping back to select, build, and prepare the ideal team to handle fast-moving issues is not always practical. So teaming is here to stay.

Kim Flintoff's insight:

Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson is known for her research on teaming, the idea that in today’s fast-paced world, organizations cannot rely on stable teams; instead, they must embrace a culture of teaming—people coming together impromptu to work on a shifting mix of projects with a shifting mix of partners. She wrote:

Teaming is about identifying essential collaborators and quickly getting up to speed on what they know so you can work together to get things done. This more flexible teamwork (in contrast to stable teams) is on the rise in many industries because the work—be it patient care, product development, customized software, or strategic decision-making—increasingly presents complicated interdependencies that have to be managed on the fly. The time between an issue arising and when it must be resolved is shrinking fast. Stepping back to select, build, and prepare the ideal team to handle fast-moving issues is not always practical. So teaming is here to stay.

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